''Random Acts of Senseless Violence'' is a

dystopian A dystopia (lit. "bad place") is an imagined world or society in which people lead wretched, dehumanized, fearful lives. It is an imagined place (possibly state) in which everything is unpleasant or bad, typically a totalitarian or environmenta ...

and

speculative fiction Speculative fiction is an umbrella term, umbrella genre of fiction that encompasses all the subgenres that depart from Realism (arts), realism, or strictly imitating everyday reality, instead presenting fantastical, supernatural, futuristic, or ...

novel by

Jack Womack Jack Womack (born January 8, 1956) is an American author of fiction and speculative fiction. Womack was born in Lexington, Kentucky, and now lives in New York City with his wife and daughter. "Yeah, I was in Kentucky. Lived there till I was 21, ...

Plot introduction

The novel is told in the form of a fictional diary by the 12-year-old protagonist Lola Hart, and details Lola and her family's experiences in a near-future

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

in which violence, rising unemployment, and riots are commonplace in the city, as well as the rest of the United States. As the novel progresses, Lola transforms from a student at one of Manhattan's most privileged

private school A private school or independent school is a school not administered or funded by the government, unlike a State school, public school. Private schools are schools that are not dependent upon national or local government to finance their fina ...

s to a street-wise gangster as she and her family struggle to survive the despair of a crumbling government and economy.

Critical reception

The book did not attract significant attention on release; though there were a few

reviews A review is an evaluation of a publication, product, service, or company or a critical take on current affairs in literature, politics or culture. In addition to a critical evaluation, the review's author may assign the work a rating to indic ...

, it was not nominated for any awards even though Womack's previous work, '' Elvissey'', won the prestigious Philip K. Dick Award and was shortlisted for the

Locus Award The Locus Awards are an annual set of literary awards voted on by readers of the science fiction and fantasy magazine '' Locus'', a monthly magazine based in Oakland, California. The awards are presented at an annual banquet. Originally a poll ...

. In a July 2008 article for

Tor.com ''Reactor'', formerly ''Tor.com'', is an online science fiction and fantasy magazine published by Tor Books, a division of Macmillan Publishers. The magazine publishes articles, reviews, original short fiction, re-reads and commentary on specul ...

Jo Walton Jo Walton (born 1964) is a Welsh-Canadian fantasy and science fiction writer and poet. She is best known for the fantasy novel '' Among Others'', which won the Hugo and Nebula Awards in 2012, and '' Tooth and Claw'', a Victorian-era novel w ...

decried the critical neglect of the work. Walton speculated that its lack of prominence was due to its initial low-key reception, the "singularly appalling"

cover art Cover art is a type of artwork presented as an illustration or photograph on the outside of a published product, such as a book (often on a dust jacket), magazine, newspaper ( tabloid), comic book, video game ( box art), music album ( album ar ...

of the early editions, a title that was "off-putting" and misleading, and its disconnect from the ''

zeitgeist In 18th- and 19th-century German philosophy, a ''Zeitgeist'' (; ; capitalized in German) is an invisible agent, force, or daemon dominating the characteristics of a given epoch in world history. The term is usually associated with Georg W. F ...

'' of the time, which was focused on

cyberpunk Cyberpunk is a subgenre of science fiction in a dystopian futuristic setting said to focus on a combination of "low-life and high tech". It features futuristic technological and scientific achievements, such as artificial intelligence and cyberwa ...

and

space opera Space opera is a subgenre of science fiction that emphasizes Space warfare in science fiction, space warfare, with use of melodramatic, risk-taking space adventures, relationships, and chivalric romance. Set mainly or entirely in outer space, i ...

. She was echoed by fellow science fiction author

Cory Doctorow Cory Efram Doctorow (; born 17 July 1971) is a Canadian-British blogger, journalist, and science fiction author who served as co-editor of the blog ''Boing Boing''. He is an activist in favour of liberalising copyright laws and a proponent of th ...

, who described the work as "an unflinching, engrossing, difficult coming-of-age story" and referred to it as "Womack's underappreciated masterpiece".

William Gibson William Ford Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as cyberpunk. Beginning his writing career in the late 1970s, his ear ...

described it as the book he thinks is most underrated.

Publication history

* 1993, UK, HarperCollins, , Pub date October 1993, Hardback * 1994, US, Atlantic Monthly Press, , Pub date September 1994, Hardback * 1994, UK, HarperCollins, , Pub date October 1994, Paperback * 1995, US, Grove Press, , Pub date October 1995, Paperback * 2013, UK, Gollancz, , Pub date October 2013, Paperback

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Random Acts Of Senseless Violence 1993 American novels Novels by Jack Womack Dystopian novels 1993 science fiction novels Dryco series Novels set in Manhattan HarperCollins books